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I've recently had to go through this process as my laptop has been on the fritz of late. In short, it had taken to completely freezing at random intervals with no prior warning, forcing a hard reboot - and usually a cooling off period in between before returning to normal operation. Average frequency of these crashes was once a week, although I would occasionally get a bad day where it would crash 3-4 times in rapid succession.

I first experienced this problem when I started on my current project and began using the laptop as a linux development machine in earnest, prior to which it had been an occasionally-used Windows box. My natural inclination when these problems first occurred was a problem with Fedora Core 2, which I'd installed for the project. After 3 re-installations of the OS (both FC1 and FC2) with no change in the symptoms, I realized it wasn't a software issue. These findings were also in keeping with my general belief that Unix OSs don't behave that way. Adding further weight to my conviction was a crash occuring on one of the brief occasions where I'd rebooted to Windows XP for some reason...

"Bugger!", I thought, "Looks like a hardware problem - time to speak to Dell" :-(

(Mentally, I was leaning toward a dodgy motherboard, as I've run diagnostics previously on the hard drive and RAM with nothing untoward reported.)

The problem with dealing with help desks in general is that they are usually ill-equipped to deal with problem domains beyond the ordinary. When it comes to PCs, "the ordinary" almost always refers to running some flavour of Windows. The realization that I would have to explain I was running "not Windows" almost 100% of the time chilled me to the bone. From a diagnosis perspective, this problem was tricky in that I had no way of reproducing it and the frequency was non-deterministic enough that I couldn't even guarantee when it would next occur.

Sure enough, my first phone call was an uphill battle through molasses. After explaining the issue to my Dell consultant (hereafter known as C1) she attempted to get me to run hard drive diagnostics whilst the laptop was booting. After 4-5 attempts, I was completely unsuccessful. As it turned out later, the key combination she was instructing me to use was for an entirely different series of laptops. Bear in mind this is a Dell employee who didn't have the correct information of the diagnostic key combination for their own hardware!

Less disturbing but more amusing for my collegues who were witness to half my phone conversation were C1's attempts to follow the usual problem resolution flowchart in a later part of the conversation. Obviously targeting the "ordinary" segment of the market, some of the suggestions offered to me were:

1. "It could very well be a virus! Do you have up-to-date virus protection software installed?". Bzzzzt, not in Linux land baby! There was a slim chance that I was the first ever victim of the first ever nasty Linux-based virus, but I doubted it. And it doesn't explain the Windows crash I'd seen, although I'm not naive enough to believe it could have been caused by one of the 100+ things that cause Windows to behave erratically on a regular basis.

2. "Have you tried clearing out your Internet Explorer browser file cache?" Hmmm, so you think the problem affecting me whilst using FC2 is caused by something dodgy living on a different file system on a different partition on a different OS that I'm not running!

However, there is a sliver lining to this dark cloud...

Later that day, I had to call Dell back again and ended up speaking to a different consultant (C2). This one had a much better grasp of the problem solving process and didn't press the Windows issue once he realized it wasn't a factor. He also understood that the nature of the problem was slippery enough that the underlying cause might lay in several areas. Therefore, he dispatched a service person with a new motherboard, RAM stick, CPU, CPU fan and hard drive, hoping this sledgehammer would crack my nut of a problem. Now, we were getting somewhere!

Once the service guy arrived (he left it late in the day as I'd requested, so my downtime during work hours was limited), I even managed to convince him to postpone the hard drive replacement for a later visit (if needed) as a new hard drive would require a full working day of software re-installation and configuration, a task I would prefer to avoid if possible.

And, fingers crossed, I think my laptop is now OK. It's been 12 days and counting since it's new motherboard, memory, CPU and fan were fitted and no signs of freezing as yet. Woot!

So, my overall impression of Dell's technical support services were: generally favourable. C2 was very customer-focussed and bright enough to realize the slightly unique nature of my environment and problem. His attitude overcame the nasty taste C1 had left me with. The logistics of the service do present their own problems - offshoring to a country where English is a second language can present communication issues, which are be exasperating when dealing with inflexible problem resolution processes and inflexible people following them.

But, as with most things, it's the human element which makes or breaks the impression. I don't believe Dell technical support is inherently evil, however given the number of horror stories I've heard or witnessed (e.g., a consultant asking which software application caused the key to physically drop off the keyboard!) suggests there are far too many Dell technical support personnel operating along the lines of C1 and far too few like C2.

p.s. C2 will definitely be getting a nice feedback email from me once 2 weeks have expired and I'm convinced the problem has been resolved.